Video conferencing technologies have become increasingly commonplace. Such technologies are now being used worldwide for a wide variety of both personal and business communications. For example, during a teleconference or other video conferencing session, individuals may “interact” and engage in face-to-face conversations through images and sound captured by digital cameras and transmitted to participants. There is a growing reliance on such network-based video conferencing and video chat applications and services, such as Skype®, Google Chat®, and iChat®. However, video conferencing in which participants do not remain relatively stationary continue to present significant challenges in image capture and display quality.
In some cases, there may be video conferences where participants wish to move through their environment, and/or where there may be multiple participants in a single room transmitting to other remote users or receivers. A video conference session in which there is real-time variability in the position of participants(s) relative to a camera or to one another may preclude the capture of a consistent or reliable view of the participants(s) for the remote users. For example, as a participant moves closer to a video camera, such as to interact with a display positioned close to the camera, the participant may obstruct a remote user's view of the environment. This may be compounded by the presence of multiple participants. The ability to discern faces and/or expressions for stationary participants can be limited in such situations. Although various techniques have been employed for improving the quality of video conferencing, there remain significant areas for new and improved ideas for capturing and presenting video in video conferencing sessions.